The 60,000,000,000 Double Dollar Man
by sunshineditty
Summary: "Such a loyal, loyal little lap dog you are, Stiles. Makes me want to collar and cage you for my own."


Stiles looked at the ridiculous costume lying on the bed and glared at Peter.

"Really, dude? Really?"

Peter smirked even as his eyes rove Stiles' body as if measuring for the perfect fit. "It will look good on you."

"Hey, Pedowolf, eyes up top!" Stiles shivers with disgust. He doesn't know why he had thought it would work.

"Stiles, you must really get over your infantile reactions to my presence if you want our partnership to flourish."

The obscene way Peter's mouth curled around the word "partnership" almost made Stiles miss the buried insult, and he straightened to his full height, a bare half inch taller than the necrowolf.

"Look, we both know _you_ need _me_ so don't try to play it off any other way. And that -" he pointed imperiously at the red dress complete with red satin-lined black cape - "will never be worn by me, so you might as well send it back to whatever kiddie porn website you got it from."

Peter sighed and massaged his temples as if dealing with the almost seventeen-year-old was the biggest headache of his resurrected life.

"Fine, you don't have to wear the Red Riding Hood costume," he easily agreed, then ruined it by adding, "though you will be in my dreams."

"Do you stay up at night thinking up creepy and obnoxious rejoinders?"

"Would you like me better if I was a sulky broody wolf?" his blue eyes gleamed with malicious humor.

Stiles ignored the pointed reference to Derek by turning away to rifle through his dresser for a change of clothes. Ever since the Alphas rolled into town and declared war on the Beacon Hills Pack, Derek transitioned from Edward Cullen style brooding straight into Bronte hero territory. It was demoralizing for the pack, to say the least, and frustrating for Stiles because any time he attempted to bring up some semblance of a plan, Derek shot him down or try to intimidate him into silence until he couldn't take it any more; which led to this ridiculous and unfortunate circumstance.

Apparently the road to Hell _was_ paved with good intentions.

Peter approached him after the last particularly bad pack meeting (where Derek had slammed Stiles into three, count 'em, _three_ different surfaces in an attempt to shut him up) with a distinctly sympathetic face and a quietly murmured, "I would like to hear your plan to take down the Alpha Pack."

Now ordinarily when a former Bad Touch artist of psychotic proportions approaches Stiles (which, since it's Peter, was nearly every other day), he runs in the opposite direction, but his Spidey senses keep warning him something big and bad was fast approaching, and if it means he has to deal with the devil to keep his loved ones safe, well so be it.

"Such a loyal, loyal little lap dog you are, Stiles. Makes me want to collar and cage you for my own."

Peter was suddenly much closer than he was comfortable with, namely close enough he can feel the wolf's breath across the sensitive nape of his neck. The gibbering fearful part of his brain wants to scream manfully and flail away until the creeper McCreeperson backs off, but the cold analytic side, the pragmatic strategist who knows you must kill one to save a thousand, was fully prepared for this particular situation.

Because he's fully aware of his vulnerabilities as the lone human in a pack of wolves, even if he can do magic from time to time, Stiles pow-wowed with Dr. Deaton over a few tricks and spells he might use if things get hairy (pun totally intended).

Wolves, even ex-Alpha turned Beta wolves, responded only to strength; it was literally coded into their DNA to respond to a strict hierarchy and Stiles fucked up the structure because he didn't fit the nice neat parameters they understood. For him to back down even a little to Peter, essentially submitting to his will, would send the wrong sort of message and would make the older wolf double his joking-couched-serious invitations.

Derek explained after he ascended to Pack-leader that an Alpha doesn't need the permission of anyone he wishes to turn unless it's his or her mate. Forcing the change upon a potential mate screws with the pack bonds in ways Derek couldn't adequately describe, but Stiles was able to understand enough to finally answer the pressing question of _why _Peter had asked rather than just doing it.

It was both complimentary and terrifying at the same time. Peter was unlike any of the other wolves, Derek included, and for him to make it happen so he would rise from the dead like a wolven Lazarus indicated some pretty large plans in the works, magically induced, which made Stiles doubly wary.

So, Stiles did what he did best: he babbled as distraction while secretly whipping out his handy-dandy cannister of wolfsbane and squirted it in Peter's face.

Well, he intended to squirt it in the _vicinity_ of Peter's face, just so he would get a whiff of the laced air, but he misjudged how close the older wolf was and got him full on eyes and nose. The bubbling and screaming were fascinating in a purely academic way, but horror soon outweighed even that when Peter fell to his knees clutching at the damage. It was sickeningly close to how he looked when Stiles first met him, face half-melted from the Hale House fire, and he felt his gorge rise at the evidence of his own ruthlessness, even if it was done accidentally.

"Oh my God, dude, I'm sorry, I didn't mean...I just meant to...oh god, what do I do?"

Peter was in no condition to respond, half-gasping on the floor as if his airways were compromised, which they probably were since he inhaled the full shot through his nose and half-opened mouth. A merry tone burbled from the downed wolf's pocket, shocking Stiles from the pitiful sight.

Instinctively he scrambled through Peter's coat and gratefully pressed the on button once he found the small black cell, sure it would be a packmate who would help.

His half-garbled " I need -" was cut off by a low growly male voice he _definitely_ didn't recognize.

"Have you captured the human boy yet, Peter? Our deal won't go through without him."

"What?"

"If you want us to kill your Alpha, you must deliver the Stiliniski kid before we will act. Bring him to the bridge tonight or no deal."

The caller hung up, leaving Stiles clutching the purloined phone and staring at a now very unconscious wolf.

_What now, Stiles? Do you kill one to save a thousand? Or yourself?_

* * *

**A/N: Inspired by Obsessivekumpulsivereadr's "Stiles...Has Potential" on A03 and a weird conversation I had with the author a few weeks ago, though this kinda went in a very different direction than I originally intended. Title because I was watching _Trigun_ and I couldn't think of anything better.**


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